Help end medical misogyny. Sign our petition.

Help end medical misogyny.
Sign our petition.

Sign the petition

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

The liminality of sex perception, sex-based spaces and bodily autonomy.

1000 replies

polypostwonder · 20/05/2026 15:31

This thread continues a discussion between BonfireLady (sorry, I wanted to tag you but the system says your username doesn't currently exist) and I on biological sex vs perceived/observed sex in https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womensrights/5530455-us-to-open-worlds-first-childrens-detransition-clinic-texas-hospital-to-offer-free-services-reversing-the-effects-of-gender-affirming-treatments?page=10&reply=152406258

She has requested I answer the following two questions:

  1. would you consider that a viable way forward is for you to self-exclude from women's spaces and instead either advocate for third spaces for anyone to use (e.g. unisex facilities in addition to single-sex) or (probably your least preferred) use the men's?
  2. would you support a restriction on anyone under 18 (or 25?) making permanent changes to their body, to match it with their perception of their "gender"? Similar to other restrictions on permanent body changes.

I believe I have previously answered them both. My answers today are superficially the same, but I have better thought out my answers (maybe?). To do this though, I need to share some assumptions.

In the previous thread, I believe there was somewhat of an agreement on the following statements:

  1. People can identify a man when dressed in clothes 'traditionally associated' with women. Clothes are superficial to sex.
  2. People look at other people and perceive their sex. People are not identifying the gametes/sry/chromosomes/other unobservable immutable biologic factor inside another person.
  3. Assumptions about sex are made based on a person’s sex characteristics amongst other observable cues.
  4. Pretty much every person in the whole world "exists within the expectations of sex categories". Very rarely it's unclear.
  5. If a person exists within the expectations of sex categories, then socially they are treated as that sex whether they wish to be or not.

Building on those statements and previous discussion, some additional thoughts:

  1. ‘Biological sex’ is defined by a person’s gametes/chromosomes/sry/other unobservable immutable biologic factor. This cannot be changed.
  2. ’Observable sex’ is based upon the perception of sex characteristics rather than known biological sex and influences the placement and treatment of people in social sex categories. Perception is not under control of the observed, nor is it a demand of others.
  3. Observable sex can be heavily influenced by biological sex and sex-based function. But sex-based function is not a requirement for the perception of sex.
  4. Women’s rights are a cultural accommodation to rebalance access to society and ensure health, fair treatment, safety and/or dignity. Not all women require or access every right, but these rights are a vital benefit to women as a class.
  5. Users of a culturally defined space for members of one sex may feel comfort, privacy or protection through separation from non-users. But all users share an equal right to feel comfort, privacy or protection.
  6. Misogyny is not biologically based. It is a prejudice directed at women’s observable sex. Sexism can be biologically directed, but it can also be directed at members of an observable sex.
  7. Sex realists believe every person should live and be treated by society according to their biological sex, no exceptions.
  8. Trans people have a wide range of beliefs and goals. They do not share a single motivation.
  9. Better quality research should be done with trans people of all ages.

I think BonfireLady is correct in saying each of us sees the other's "belief" as non-sensical and our own as position as factual. I'm hoping we can discuss this from a somewhat sensical space.

OP posts:
Thread gallery
10
murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:24

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:18

I am out on this website as a person who transitioned. Of course it is going to distort gender critical people's perceptions of me. There is no bigger sin.

Well that's bollocks. Transitioning isn't a sin, you silly man. Claiming to be a woman isn't a sin either but it is wrong. I'm not Christian so the sin concept can be ignored for me. But your behaviour in flouting the law and saying that you will continue to do so is abhorrent, and your treatment of actual women is the same.

This isn't about sinning, it's about lying and abuse of both people and spaces. It's about your behaviour.

You do you, but in the spaces you are legally supposed to be in, and don't you dare speak to Taztoy as you have.

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:25

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:23

And a really nasty edit to infer that I am excessively triggered.

I see you.

He's a bit simple if he doesn't realise that the pre edits show.....

FlirtsWithRhinos · 29/05/2026 23:27

Wearenotborg · 29/05/2026 23:09

No we don’t, youre totally here for validation.

I'd say domination rather than validation. He gives the same vibes as blokes in the 80s and 90s who used to enjoy baiting Feminist me by making sexist statements as if they were just plain facts. Any response I made, they just doubled down on the flat statements.

They demonstrated their disdain for me and my arguments, and their confidence in their male power to define, not by arguing and engaging and winning, but by ignoring and simply restating.

Very very much the same vibe.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:31

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:24

Well that's bollocks. Transitioning isn't a sin, you silly man. Claiming to be a woman isn't a sin either but it is wrong. I'm not Christian so the sin concept can be ignored for me. But your behaviour in flouting the law and saying that you will continue to do so is abhorrent, and your treatment of actual women is the same.

This isn't about sinning, it's about lying and abuse of both people and spaces. It's about your behaviour.

You do you, but in the spaces you are legally supposed to be in, and don't you dare speak to Taztoy as you have.

I stand by the word 'sin.'

I also have no ill intent in responding to Taztoy. I was triggered more than once today. I cannot post what wanted to post for reasons that it would be removed and I don't need another pass through the mumsnet 'it was gay rape' carousel.

OP posts:
FlirtsWithRhinos · 29/05/2026 23:32

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:23

We will never know, because it will never happen.

You're right, though. I don't know how my friends would relate to me if they knew my entire history. We both know perceptively trans people experience hate, harassment and discrimination. But I am not, and I've not had to live that life. I don't have to live that life as if I am not currently required to have a tattoo on my forehead or wear a badge everywhere I go, lest someone become 'confused.'

Oh please. Do yourself the dignity of not equating "not lying to your friends and family" with "a tattoo on your forehead or a badge".

It is not "hate" to ask that you not appropriate the name of the half of humanity that is female to name an emotional state of men.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:34

FlirtsWithRhinos · 29/05/2026 23:32

Oh please. Do yourself the dignity of not equating "not lying to your friends and family" with "a tattoo on your forehead or a badge".

It is not "hate" to ask that you not appropriate the name of the half of humanity that is female to name an emotional state of men.

We both know that is not the 'hate' to which I was referring.

OP posts:
murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:34

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:31

I stand by the word 'sin.'

I also have no ill intent in responding to Taztoy. I was triggered more than once today. I cannot post what wanted to post for reasons that it would be removed and I don't need another pass through the mumsnet 'it was gay rape' carousel.

Well you trigger women every time you claim to be one of us and appropriate our experiences.

If you like the word sin, there one for you.

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:36

I’ve never once minimised any rape, gay or otherwise.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:36

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:34

Well you trigger women every time you claim to be one of us and appropriate our experiences.

If you like the word sin, there one for you.

If women are indeed triggered by my reading my words telling them I am a woman, then that is their response to me saying I am trans, not me (or them) being in any real space.

OP posts:
Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:39

I do not require your consent as a woman.

I can’t believe that post. Genuinely. A man comes on here and tells a violent rape survivor that he doesn’t require her consent.

and that triggers me and somehow im “excessively triggered”

jesus fucking Christ.

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:40

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:36

If women are indeed triggered by my reading my words telling them I am a woman, then that is their response to me saying I am trans, not me (or them) being in any real space.

Edited

Not so. There have been trans people on here who have accepted their biological sex but feel amd present differently, who have had interesting and thoughtful things to say, from whom I've had some points to ponder. And others have seemed to as well.

You are so far from that.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:41

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:40

Not so. There have been trans people on here who have accepted their biological sex but feel amd present differently, who have had interesting and thoughtful things to say, from whom I've had some points to ponder. And others have seemed to as well.

You are so far from that.

Oh I'm sure. I'll just have to be one of the bad ones then.

OP posts:
Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:43

I have a legal right to single sex spaces.

poly is a man. Legally.

he does not have any right to be in a woman’s single sex space

that makes him sad and I can empathise with that but he still doesn’t get to be in a single sex space. Campaign for a fourth space.

and for the love of Jeff dont ever tell a rape survivor that you don’t require their consent. Because that is abhorrent and I honestly can’t get my head around how anyone would say that to a rape survivor.

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:43

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:43

I have a legal right to single sex spaces.

poly is a man. Legally.

he does not have any right to be in a woman’s single sex space

that makes him sad and I can empathise with that but he still doesn’t get to be in a single sex space. Campaign for a fourth space.

and for the love of Jeff dont ever tell a rape survivor that you don’t require their consent. Because that is abhorrent and I honestly can’t get my head around how anyone would say that to a rape survivor.

Particularly someone who claims to be a rape survivor.

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:45

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:43

Particularly someone who claims to be a rape survivor.

Im honestly stunned. I don’t know or understand how that’s acceptable to say to me.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:46

Catiette · 29/05/2026 19:27

PPW, I'm going to try a slightly different tack here.

I know GPs who have treated people who are, likely, in a similar position to you (obviously just brief and anonymous references to lifelong transexuals by intelligent professionals for whom I have deep respect). They always emphasise that such patients are a vanishingly small, even "once-in-a-career", minority, and express their concern for the challenges they face. I shared their concern then, and I still share this concern now. I wondered what it must be like then, and I still do now. I wondered how society could be changed to support such people, and I still do now.

In becoming gender critical, I haven't been "captured" by some niche ideology, or radicalised by Mumsnet, or whatever else. My views are much as they always were, really: I've always believed in empathetic accommodation of such individuals where possible.

But the political landscape around me has changed, and I've read widely on both sides of this debate and engaged in hour upon hour of conversations with, (hopefully) good-faith visitors like yourself. And as a result of this - of external forces and influences - my previously expansive "where possible" has been squeezed, brutally, into a regrettable fragment of what it was before. It no longer feels possible to me to give you what you want, because it asks too much - not just of me, but of women the world over; and because it takes too much - from research, from infrastructure, I'd even argue from your own demographic (and others who don't belong to it, but are swept up in it). From a personal but also a ruthlessly utilitarian, an ethical, and even a holistically empathetic perspective - all those - I just can't.

I notice that you've still not addressed my earlier monster-post, and several since, about the wider implications (again, the political, ethical and practical - on an historical and global scale) of leaving adult human females without a word of their own.

In my own posts on this, I've cited women's history - our clarity, continuity and ownership. I've examine the ongoing global oppression of women, with specific reference to the women in Afghanistan, with anecdotal evidence of what's at stake. The fact that women continue to be injured and die in their tens of thousands right here, in the UK, because of their ongoing invisibility in medicine and health and safety - before we even get to pregnancy and childbirth. Women's frighteningly recent acquisition of a political identity and voice, in the vote. Women's terrifyingly recent acquisition of physical autonomy in marriage - marital rape. The corruption of research studies seeking to mitigate physical harm to women by the shift in meaning of that word.

Other women on this thread have mentioned the slippery slope argument, referencing the now undeniable exploitation of our redefinition by AGPs and other dangerous males.

And behind all this has been a litany of shared experiences of individual women's trauma.

Prisons. Sports. The crippling terror of the women with PTSD in the toilet they thought was single sex. The life-changing disillusionment of the girls training 15 hours a week only to lose to a male. We all have our stories, and could fill at least as many posts with them as you have with your own. They're just as valid. And they're legion.

Are you really, truly arguing that, in all of the above - as you appeared to suggest in an earlier response to me - that "women" should be replaced by "adult human female"? Or that from now - the early 21st century - and forever after, any and all readers will somehow be able to recognise when accounts like all of mine above refer only to one "type" of women, and when it includes the other? That we should assume they will? That this is good enough for women?

I don't yet see from your posts how your determination to use our word is anything but what posters here are suggesting: a matter of urgent personal imperative. And if it is, please note: such deep-seated need is worth our empathy, and thought - and accommodation in wider society. But as long as posts like your own here also demonstrate a corresponding blindness to women's need in turn - on a personal, and political; historical and global scale; in our billions - they also demonstrate how dangerous it is for us to concede one inch in this matter at this time, even if we wish to do so. And, in this way, this movement's resistance to ceding women so much as a word of their own is harming you and your own - fatal flaw, Greek tragedy, it's all right here in this story.

Do you have arguments beyond the personal, that address these wider issues?

Edited

I haven't had to deeply discuss feminist theory with anyone since the 90s and never with incorporating anything trans into it, so while I agreed with a lot of your response to my post, I felt like I could be worthwhile to me to try to incorporate my experiences within theory points but would require work. I no longer feel like it is worth that work. At least not now. I'm sorry for wasting your time.

OP posts:
murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:46

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:45

Im honestly stunned. I don’t know or understand how that’s acceptable to say to me.

I have no idea. It's beyond disgusting.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:49

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:43

I have a legal right to single sex spaces.

poly is a man. Legally.

he does not have any right to be in a woman’s single sex space

that makes him sad and I can empathise with that but he still doesn’t get to be in a single sex space. Campaign for a fourth space.

and for the love of Jeff dont ever tell a rape survivor that you don’t require their consent. Because that is abhorrent and I honestly can’t get my head around how anyone would say that to a rape survivor.

No woman requires permission to be in women's space. I respect your right to your belief, but your belief does not weigh the control of consent over my very real presence in woman as a class, or within women's space.

OP posts:
Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:50

A man on the feminist part of mn told à rape survivor that he doesn’t require her consent and somehow

a. That’s ok

b. It’s her fault anyway for being excessively triggered.

and it’s ok for him to write that ad it’s not deleted. But I can’t describe my rape because it’s too upsetting for others to read.

what. The. Fuck.

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:51

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:49

No woman requires permission to be in women's space. I respect your right to your belief, but your belief does not weigh the control of consent over my very real presence in woman as a class, or within women's space.

Edited

You are a man. You do not care if I consent or not.

says it all.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:51

Taztoy · 29/05/2026 23:50

A man on the feminist part of mn told à rape survivor that he doesn’t require her consent and somehow

a. That’s ok

b. It’s her fault anyway for being excessively triggered.

and it’s ok for him to write that ad it’s not deleted. But I can’t describe my rape because it’s too upsetting for others to read.

what. The. Fuck.

You can keep calling me a man. That is what is done on mumsnet. It does not however change the reality of my life.

OP posts:
murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:52

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:49

No woman requires permission to be in women's space. I respect your right to your belief, but your belief does not weigh the control of consent over my very real presence in woman as a class, or within women's space.

Edited

Well the law says you're a man, and all your cells do, so you would require permission, and I for one say no.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:52

murasaki · 29/05/2026 23:52

Well the law says you're a man, and all your cells do, so you would require permission, and I for one say no.

The law does not say I am a man. The law is based on a lot of factors, the least of which is what mumsnet calls another member.

OP posts:
FlirtsWithRhinos · 29/05/2026 23:52

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:34

We both know that is not the 'hate' to which I was referring.

That is what I was referring to.

So if in response to my comment you referenced something else that you refer to as "hate" you will have to explain how it connects to what I meant, which you yourself acknowledge is not "hate".

And to be clear, I have no doubt that trans people do face anger and agression that is nothing to with the valid Gender Critical objection to the appropriation of woman-the-female as a label for a mixed-sex emotional identity. And that is wrong.

But the injustice you face does not give yiu the right to enact your own injustice on women to alleviate it. You need to find a better way.

polypostwonder · 29/05/2026 23:53

FlirtsWithRhinos · 29/05/2026 23:52

That is what I was referring to.

So if in response to my comment you referenced something else that you refer to as "hate" you will have to explain how it connects to what I meant, which you yourself acknowledge is not "hate".

And to be clear, I have no doubt that trans people do face anger and agression that is nothing to with the valid Gender Critical objection to the appropriation of woman-the-female as a label for a mixed-sex emotional identity. And that is wrong.

But the injustice you face does not give yiu the right to enact your own injustice on women to alleviate it. You need to find a better way.

I am referring to the cultural bias against trans people that exists in almost every country on earth.

OP posts:
Please create an account

To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.

This thread is not accepting new messages.